


we are all broken, that’s how the light gets in

by NeverEverFaceTheDark



Category: She-Ra and the Princesses of Power (2018)
Genre: Angst, F/F, self-indulgent angst
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-22
Updated: 2020-05-22
Packaged: 2021-03-02 19:21:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,135
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24321964
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NeverEverFaceTheDark/pseuds/NeverEverFaceTheDark
Summary: Prime casts out all shadows.It was true.Even She-Ra's light had not burned her so badly.(Catra's terrible time in Horde Prime's hands)
Relationships: Adora/Catra (She-Ra), Catra & Horde Prime (She-Ra)
Comments: 26
Kudos: 188





	we are all broken, that’s how the light gets in

She was ready for the end. As prepared for it as could be expected. It wasn't like she mattered - not to anyone - not to - not to Horde Prime.

She'd stolen his actual asset, his bait, his honoured _guest_ , right from under his not-nose. She'd destroyed his chance to get his hands on Adora, the leader of the Rebellion. If there was one thing she'd learned, it was that her superiors did not take kindly to betrayal.

Even Hordak hadn't hesitated to try and kill her, by the end. And Horde Prime was not Hordak. 

(Explosions the size of oceans flared in the corners of her eyes - dotted in neat lines across the planet's surface. She never learned the planet's name.)

Horde Prime was not Hordak.

So she should have known.

Really.

She should have known.

It was not the end. 

* * *

She could not escape her restraints, no matter how she struggled. There was no way to twist her wrists to get her claws into the steel.

Clones dragged her through the endless corridors of the ship, their pace merciless, her scrabbling leaving long lines of carved up floor in their wake. The clones' scent was that distinct mix of bland and acrid, their disdain and indifference towards her nearly tangible. 

It kind of made her feel like a kid again.

A laugh burst from her - bubbling up as unbidden hysteria. Entirely unlike what she'd scraped up to serve as a taunt. As a last hurrah.

No one was coming. 

That was good. That was the plan.

* * *

She fought. 

She'd been raised to fight, trained to fight - had the fight beaten into her until she could beat back.

But it didn't matter. Her wrists were bound, and there were too many clones, too many hands in her neck, too many knees in her back, pressing _down._

Down, like pulling air into her lungs that refused to give her any relief - down, like she could try and breathe all she liked but couldn't - couldn't -

"You've chosen a good time to turn against me, little sister," Prime said with a clone's lips.

"I'm not -" she said, and then the words died in her mouth - expanded into a wail - shrivelled into keening.

For one moment, it was as though a knife had been driven into the back of her neck - then pain multiplied and multiplied until there was no Catra left - only agony in the shape of a body. She was consumed, her nerves scorched and then charred to their ends.

In the impossible, undefined afterwards, the first thing she became aware of was Prime's order to re-calibrate the chip implantation procedure. 

It was an order he did not speak out loud.

* * *

_Prime casts out all shadows._

It was true. 

Even She-Ra's light had not burned her so badly. 

* * *

She'd never liked water - and she had worked very hard to make sure that she would _never_ feel the sharp sting of electricity on her skin again. That is what she'd thought about when first seeing Prime's so-called purification pool in action. It's what she thought about still when its current passed through the marrow of her bones and she screamed and _screamed_. 

Hordak was there - she knew it was him - a halfstep behind Prime, watching, his face empty. They were all watching - exactly 22 clones, like last time. Like she was a show - or an experiment - or a sacrifice. Their voices echoed - they echoed in her head - thousands of them - thousands of brothers, thousands of pinpricks in the dark, hungering, chanting and chanting and chanting, 

No one was coming.

* * *

"Please," she slurred, an immeasurable time later, "stop."

"Little sister," he replied, standing at her back, "all you have to do is come into the Light."

She knew he was lying. 

She knew he was speaking the truth.

One of his creepy hair tentacles crept along her neck. A visceral shudder almost tipped her forward.

His hand landed on her shoulder, steadying her, the metal of his finger digging into her skin. 

It was a touch without kindness. 

"Show me your pain, and I will take it away," he said. 

Even Shadow Weaver hadn't gone so far as to actually reach into her mind. At least, she didn't think so. She hadn't been important enough to mess with like _that_ \- not like - not like Adora.

She could not bite back another whimper as his consciousness (gargantuan, crushing, disgusting) gripped the memory - Adora, bound to the table, the numb imprint of Shadow Weaver's hand on Catra's arm, the inculcated dread at her snarl singing in her veins, the caustic blaze of rage, the frigid pain of familiar rejection - freezing her insides into something sharper than they had been before. Sharper and sharper - like crystals breaking.

"Hmmm," he murmured as he rooted further, turning up every terrible thing she'd ever done - every terrible thing that had ever been done to her. 

Tears burned in her eyes and her chest spasmed. Adora, promising - promising that nothing bad could happen if they stayed together. Shadow Weaver's hand on her cheek. The paralysis of her magic. Adora, saying that the Horde was evil, that she would not come back. Entrapta's body crumbling to the floor. Scorpia turning her back. Adora, hanging from a cliff, and Catra, cutting through the webbing that allowed her to hold on. Adora, looking at her, eyes cold and merciless, the portal behind her still sparking. 

"She left you," he hummed, "she broke your heart." He slipped his hand up to the back of her neck, right over whatever he'd grafted into her spine. It pulsed with her heartbeat - behind her eyes, in her teeth. "I can make it whole again."

He pushed her in.

Her lungs filled with green liquid - too tired to keep her head above water, too tired to cough it up - but somehow incapable of drowning.

* * *

_Cast out all shadows._

_Cast out all shadows._

_Cast out all shadows._  
  


* * *

No one was coming. 

Adora was not coming.

She sobbed once - retched more foul green onto the floor. 

She knew that Adora was not coming.

But she wanted her to. She wanted - 

Please.

She was losing it - she was 

Nothing made sense, she couldn't remember, couldn't -

The drone in her ears was incessant.

She tried to curl up but - her limbs wouldn't -

She was

really scared.

* * *

_All beings must suffer to become pure._

* * *

They stripped her of her clothes. They cut her hair.

But it didn't matter. It was good.

One voice sounded above all others - His voice.

It spoke of peace.

It was all that mattered. 

It was good.

* * *

"I have made you anew, sister. I have set you free."

Horde Prime sat, triumphant, all-powerful and all-knowing.

She looked up at him. The hivemind whispered. 

"Thank you," she said, and meant it with every fibre of her being.

**Author's Note:**

> I had to laugh at Catra and Melog freaking the fuck out about evil Mermista's watery murder attempts but you know what?
> 
> Maybe it wasn't actually so funny.
> 
> :)


End file.
